First-person narratives, cultural histories, nature and science writing, and fiction comprise this anthology of writing on the Arctic, surveying four centuries of exploring and scientific study while calling for the preservation of this rapidly changing region. Climate change expert and New Yorker staff writer Elizabeth Kolbert includes accounts by polar explorers and writers like John Franklin, Robert Peary, Gretel Ehrlich, Jack London, Fridtjof Nansen, Barry Lopez, Andrea Barrett, and Jules Verne.